Buffy: Interrupted
by Thorn Wild
Summary: After a six year long psychosis, Buffy Summers wakes up to find that there is no such thing as vampires and demons. But holding onto this new reality becomes harder than she could have imagined when she meets a schizophrenic Englishman called Will who bears a striking resemblance to a certain vampire from her hallucinations. AU.
1. Normal Again

_**Author's Note: **So, this is probably not the most original idea, but it came to me and I just couldn't not write it. __I don't normally do AU, but when an idea just comes into your head like this you can't really pass it up. This veers off course at the end of the season 6 episode 'Normal Again'. __I'm not gonna say too much about it, as it's still a work in progress and I have no idea where it's going, but I'm pretty sure there will be smut at some point, because, well, this is still Spuffy, and I'm writing it._

_I hope you like it. If you do, or if you don't, feel free to leave a review telling me why. Enjoy!_

* * *

CHAPTER ONE

Normal Again

Her mother gazes into her eyes, concern and love and hope etched into her features. 'I know you're afraid. I know the world feels like a hard place, sometimes. But you've got people who love you. Your dad and I, we have all the faith in the world in you. We'll always be with you. You have got a world of strength in your heart. I know you do. You just have to find it again. Believe in yourself!'

Buffy blinks, shudders. Her mind is confused, filled with thoughts and images and ideas. _My friends are dying, I'm killing my friends, they're all going to die if I don't get back to help them…_ And then that thought comes back again, the one clear thought she has had in a long time, it seems. _That's not real. _This_ is real. My mom is alive and well and happy, and my dad loves me and there are no vampires, no evil things lurking in the dark, no hard decisions to make… This can be my life._

She meets her mother's eyes again, and she feels calm and certain. 'You're right,' she says, slowly. 'Thank you…' Then she smiles and flings her arms around her neck.

Joyce Summers hugs her daughter back, as tightly as she can muster, and sobs into her hair. 'Buffy,' she whispers. 'Oh, my baby!'

'Mom…' Buffy is crying too, and it's as though everything she's felt, for a long time, comes spilling out with those tears. All the pain, all the fear, it's gone in an instant. She's back. She's here, in the real world. And she's going home.

* * *

'What do you mean we can't take her home?' Joyce asks incredulously. 'She's my child, I want to take her home, God damnit! You promised!'

The doctor gives what might pass for a sympathetic smile but looks more like a grimace. 'Mrs. Summers, your daughter still needs therapy and supervision. She's lucid right now, and that's wonderful. But I'm afraid that at the moment we have no idea what tomorrow is going to look like, and after all the time she's spent in here, I'm afraid she's just not ready to go out into the real world just yet. I would like to keep her here, at least for another few weeks, until we know what's what, and give her a chance to at least socialise with the other patients before she can return to normal.' He puts a hand on Joyce's shoulder. 'This is going to take time, and getting her back to some semblance of normalcy will be a lot of work. But I am confident that, if she can make it through just a few more weeks here with a minimum of episodes, a full recovery is possible, with the right medications.'

Hank takes Joyce's hand and squeezes it. 'Honey, I'm sure Dr. Warrens knows what he's talking about. Let's give her some time to get her bearings before we force too much reality onto her, okay?'

Joyce nods, looking down at her lap. She sighs. 'Yeah, I guess. Fine. Thank you, doctor.'

* * *

Buffy stares at her hand. In a way, it seems so much more real that she's used to. It's bigger. More vivid and saturated in colour, even though it's so pale. She supposes she hasn't seen the sun in a while. She glances up at the window. It's very small and the blinds are down, and she can't tell what time of day it is.

She's still getting flashes, of that basement, and her friends, and the demon, but they are fewer and further between, and it's not like she's there anymore; rather, it's like she's watching the scene from above, from outside her body.

She tries to put it from her mind, and as she does, it's as though the memories of that place are fading. They're becoming less real by the minute, and more and more like some kind of dream.

The door to her room opens, and her parents walk in, followed by a nurse. Buffy looks up at them and smiles.

'Hi, mom,' she says softly, then turns her eyes to her father. 'Hi, dad.'

'Hi, honey,' says her mother, smiling back at her. She takes a deep breath and clasps her hands in front of her face, as though uncertain of what to say next. She lets her arms fall to her sides again. 'So, we've talked to Dr. Warrens. He says we can't take you home yet.'

Buffy's smile fades a little. 'But… but I'm better,' she insists. 'I'm… I know what's real! I do.'

'I know, Buffy, and the doctor knows that too,' her father tells her kindly. 'He just wants to be sure that you can manage to live out there. Interact with other people and stuff like that. You know? And he wants to be sure that you won't… Well, go back.'

Buffy looks down at her hands again. Then she nods. 'Yeah,' she says. 'No, I get that. I need to… be myself again. And I'm not really there yet.' She looks back up at her parents. 'You'll come see me though, right?'

'Of course, honey!' her mother cries, and swoops down on her, throwing her arms around her neck. 'As often as we can. Every day, if possible!' She pulls back, holding Buffy's face in her hands and stroking her cheeks with her thumbs. Her eyes are wet with tears, but she's smiling. 'Just promise me you won't go away again?'

Buffy returns the smile. 'Never,' she breathes.

Hank sits down at the foot of her bed. 'We do have some good news, though,' he says. 'Tomorrow, you'll get to go out and socialise with the other patients in the ward downstairs, and in a couple of weeks, you'll get to move out of here and into a room at the ward. Maybe you'll get a roommate!' He grins at her. 'You'll get to meet new people, stretch your legs… Eat real food…'

Buffy smiles warmly at her dad. She's missed him, she realises. She has no memory of the past six years, other than what she can still remember of her delusion. And he disappeared from that life so long ago… She wonders briefly if some of the real world might have slipped through into her hallucinations, if they mirrored what happened here. Did he stop visiting?

She shakes her head slightly. It doesn't matter. All that matters is that he's here now.

'I'm so glad you guys are here,' she whispers. 'I love you both so much!'

* * *

Food has never tasted this good, even if it's boring institution food. The eggs are bland and the pancakes taste like cardboard, and despite that, it's the best meal she's ever had.

She eats in her room, before getting dressed. She was given a sedative before bed, and went through the whole night without so much as dreaming about Sunnydale, and she woke up this morning feeling completely rested. Her parents left a bag of her own clothes with her, some of them newly bought, but she selects an outfit from back when she was sixteen anyway. She's lost a lot of weight since she came here, she notes, and the clothes hang a little loose, but she doesn't care. They're her own clothes. She briefly wonders if these clothes will date her. The new millennium has come and she has no idea what people wear now, or if it's at all similar to what she imagined in her delusion. She glances down at her outfit, a green halter top and white jeans, but her moment of insecurity passes quickly. It doesn't matter. All that matters is that she's leaving this room, in her own clothes, and she's going to talk to people. Real people, not voices in her head.

At precisely nine o'clock, a nurse enters her room. It's a man, with dark hair and olive skin, tall and muscular, as she supposes they need to be to restrain crazy people, and his name tag tells her that his name is Tony.

Tony takes her down a hall to an elevator, but Buffy asks him if they can take the stairs instead. He agrees. They go down only one flight. Then there's a door, and another hallway, and then another door, which he pushes open.

Beyond the door is a common area. It's painted white and institution green, but there are sofas and tables and chairs, and a TV and radio and there are people playing cards. Most of them look pretty normal, and she guesses she does too. Why should crazy people look any different from anybody else?

'You've been down here before,' Tony tells her. 'We try to take all solitary patients to the common area at least once a week, as long as they're not violent. So, when you were calm, we'd wheel you down here and put you in front of the TV.'

'I don't remember,' Buffy says quietly. 'I don't remember this room at all.'

'You wouldn't,' Tony admits. 'Some days you were near catatonic. Others, you were just sedated. Sometimes you'd sit and mutter to yourself, but you never reacted to anything around you.'

'How long have you been looking after me?' Buffy asks, turning to him.

'Four years, give or take,' Tony replies, smiling gently at her.

'Thank you,' says Buffy. 'For… taking care of me, I guess.'

'You're welcome,' says Tony. 'I'm glad you're better. I hope you stay that way. It's the best part of the job.'

He leaves her, and she stands alone in the middle of the room, looking around her. All these people are strangers. A couple of people are watching TV, and there's a free couch there, so she goes to sit down. They're watching a soap opera, but she doesn't mind. Soap operas are normal. She's dying for normal.

Someone plops down in the seat next to her. 'So, she walks and talks now, then?' says a voice that's far too familiar.

Buffy turns her head and stares wide-eyed at the man next to her. He has curly, peroxide-blonde hair, loose and disheveled. His eyes are a piercing shade of blue, and he has a scar above his left eyebrow, shaped kind of like a sideways letter Y. He's smirking at her, the way he always does, and for a moment she thinks her heart's stopped.

When she finds her voice, she can only think to say one thing. 'Spike?'


	2. The Man Who Was Alive

_**Author's Note: **I'm really enjoying writing this. I've always loved stories involving mental illness and institutions and the like. I've never had to spend time in one myself, but I have enough friends who have been admitted at one point or another. Hope I'll manage to do it justice. Here, for your reading pleasure, is chapter two. Thanks to those of you who have liked it enough to follow; I'd really love it if you'd leave a review and tell me your thoughts, if you have any! I'm not the kind of writer who holds my story hostage and refuse to update unless people review, but reviews are still good for my motivation. Jussayin'. It's nice to know that people want to read more, you know?_

_So, yes, chapter two, in which Buffy gets to know Will. Enjoy! _

* * *

CHAPTER TWO

The Man Who Was Alive

'Sorry, what?' he says, cocking an eyebrow.

Buffy shakes her head. It's him, it's definitely him. He's here, in his signature black t-shirt and denims, everything about him the same as it ever was. But how can that be? He's not real. He's part of the delusion.

'I…' she looks away. Maybe she's just imagining it, it's not really him. But that voice! She looks back at him. He's still there. 'Are… Are you real?' she asks, weakly.

'Well, I think so,' he says, looking slightly uncertain. 'I mean, if anything, I'd think _you_ were a figment of _my_ malfunction, not the other way around. But I could be wrong. Are you a schizo, too?' When she doesn't respond, he lifts his arm slightly from where it rests on his thigh. 'You can poke me, if you like,' he says.

She does. He's definitely there, because she can touch him. And his skin is remarkably warm, which must mean he's human.

'I'm Will,' he says, with a half smile. 'Sorry if I alarmed you, it's just… You were here only a few days ago, only then you weren't quite so… responsive.'

'You… You know me?' Buffy asks.

'Well, I wouldn't say know, exactly… More like have seen on occasion. Tried to speak to, perhaps, but you never said anything, so…'

She blinks, and turns her eyes absently to the TV. 'Huh,' she mumbles. 'Something must have slipped through…'

'What?'

She looks at Spike, who isn't Spike, who is Will, again, and smiles. 'Nothing. Nothing at all.'

'Must be something, love. Slipped through to what?'

She shudders as he calls her 'love'. An awful lot must have slipped through. Not only does he look exactly the same, he talks the same, too. His voice, his accent, his mannerisms are exactly the way she remembers from her hallucinations, and she feels her face flush as the vision of his naked body slips unbidden into her mind's eye.

'Might tell you later,' she murmurs, looking down at her hands. She takes a deep breath, trying to compose herself and turns back to him. 'So, Will, huh?'

'Yes, that's me,' he replies, smiling fully now. 'And you're Buffy.'

Buffy frowns. 'How do you know?'

Will looks away and runs a hand through his hair. 'I listen, me,' he says. 'To people, what they say… What, you think the nurses and doctors only call you patient number blank when they talk about you?' He turns his eyes back to her. 'And I remember everything,' he adds in a conspiratorial whisper. 'That's the part I don't tell the doctors about.'

'What, you mean you have, like, photographic memory?'

'I guess.' Will shrugs and leans back in his seat, his arms folded against his chest in an extremely Spike-like manner. 'So, what's your diagnosis, pet?'

'Not sure,' Buffy admits. 'But until yesterday, I thought I was a vampire slayer with super powers in a fictional town located on top of the mouth of hell, that I had a sister who was a ball of mystical energy and that three nerds with serious technical knowledge, the ability to summon demons and considerable magical power respectively were trying to kill me.' She glances at Will and finds him staring at her, a slightly amused expression on his face. 'What?'

'You are seriously bonkers, aren't you?' he says, but there's no malice in his voice.

'Hey, pot meet kettle!' she counters with a grin. 'You're in here too, aren't you? You must have wigged pretty badly at some point, too.'

He grins and ducks her ill disguised question. 'You had this… delusion how long?'

'Six years or so, I think.'

'And now you don't.'

Buffy shrugs, turning her eyes back to the TV. 'I got better.'

There's a brief silence as they both watch a heated argument between two characters that appears to have been going on for at least ten minutes with no end in sight.

'What about you?' Buffy asks quietly. 'How long have _you_ been here?'

'On and off for the past five years or so,' he replies. 'First time was voluntary. I got better, only had to come back for some therapy sessions every once in a while, took my meds, saw a shrink.'

'And then what happened?'

He glances at her, smiling wryly. 'I got dangerous for a while.'

She looks down, the corners of her mouth quirking upwards. 'Dangerous, huh?' _Not so different from his counterpart in my grand hallucination, then._

'Forgot my meds, and the voices told me to do stuff. Bad stuff. I stopped taking my meds all together, slipped off the grid, didn't go see my shrink and…' He looks away, his voice turning bitter. 'I hurt people.'

Buffy nods slowly. 'That was the illness, though, right? It wasn't really you.'

He turns his blue eyes on her once more. His head is cocked to one side and he wears a half smile. 'How would you know?'

'I just do,' Buffy replies with finality in her voice, and he doesn't push the matter.

He chuckles, his gaze falling back onto the TV. 'Anyway, they caught up with me, there was a trial, and I was sent here instead of jail, so I guess the judge agrees with you. That must have been, what…'

'Two and a half years ago?' Buffy finishes helpfully.

He looks at her again, surprise evident in his expression. 'Yeah,' he says slowly. 'Something like that… How–?'

'Stuff slipped through,' Buffy says, shrugging again.

Will appears to consider for a moment, his eyes seeming to focus on a point just above her left shoulder. 'You mean, I was in your…' his focus returns to her face, 'whatever it was?'

Buffy's face flushes again and she turns away from him to hide it, but he's already seen. 'Maybe,' she mumbles. 'I guess a part of me must have been getting impressions from the real world somehow.'

'Well, do you recognise anyone else here?' Will asks, curiously.

She looks around her at the other people in the ward. Then she shakes her head. 'Not at the moment,' she says. 'I must have invented most of the… characters, people, whatever you wanna call them.'

'But not me.'

'Well, no, you're real.'

'Aha, so you think!' he says with a grin. 'Maybe _you're_ still hallucinatin', ever think of that, love?'

'That's not really funny,' says Buffy, but smiles all the same. 'Or maybe I'm hallucinating _now_, and that other world was real.'

'What makes more sense, that you're a superhero who kills vampires or that you're a sick girl in a mental institution?'

'That's what I told Dawn…' Buffy feels an irrational pang of sorrow for the kid sister she invented for herself.

'If that world _is_ real, does that mean you're now imagining a world in which none of your friends are real except me?'

'We weren't exactly friends,' Buffy admits.

'Oh? Lovers, then?'

She blushes again. 'You really wanna know?' she asks him, wondering as she says it whether she's going to tell him the whole truth or not.

'Definitely!' he says, smirking. 'Tell me what part I played in your little fantasy.'

She takes a deep breath. 'You were a century-and-a-half-old vampire called William the Bloody, nickname of Spike. You had a vampire girlfriend named Drusilla, who was also your Sire, and the two of you plotted with my ex, who was also a vampire, but who used to be good and lost his soul so he turned evil, to kill me and end the world. Then you changed your mind and helped me kill him before taking Dru and running away.'

Will laughs. 'That's a hell of a story! I like it! What happened next?'

Buffy grins at his reaction. 'Then you came back some months later and tried to force my best friend, who was a witch, to make you a love potion to get Drusilla back because she left you. Then you changed your mind and vanished again for another few months. You turned up about two and a half years ago again, still evil, but then you were captured by these government military people, who implanted a chip in your brain so you couldn't hurt people anymore. You came to me for help, and sort of became an ally. And that's… that's where we're at, really. You were helping me and stuff. Cause you could kill monsters, just not people.'

She glances at him. He's looking thoughtful, a smile playing on his lips. 'So, I was dangerous… And then I got better?'

'Pretty much.'

'I think _you_ must listen pretty well, too, even when you don't mean to,' says Will. 'I may have been a vampire, but the chronology checks out fairly well. Was I very different?'

Buffy looks at the TV, without really watching. 'From what I can tell? Not very.'

'That's really interesting,' says Will. 'Just goes to show how much of the world we can perceive even when we're completely closed off, innit? You made up a person who looked like me and talked like me, and even shared my name, and you didn't even know me…' He glances at her sideways. 'You must have a really amazing mind.'

Buffy giggles. 'Thanks, I guess,' she says. 'I don't think anyone's ever complimented me on my mind before…'

'That's because they couldn't see it the way I can. You have a beautiful mind, Buffy.' He rubs his neck absentmindedly with his right hand. 'God, I'm dying for a fag…'

'That means cigarette in this context, right?' Buffy asks.

Will laughs. 'Yes, yes it does.' He stretches his arms above his head. 'But this fucking place doesn't have any balconies – for obvious reasons, I'll grant you – and I'm not allowed to go outside and smoke on my own. Makes keeping up a smoking habit a real pain, you know.'

Buffy closes her eyes and takes a deep breath through her nose. Will smells just like Spike; cigarettes and leather. Buffy wonders if Will has a leather duster like the one Spike did in her delusion. He isn't wearing any leather now, so whatever item of leather clothing he owns, he must wear it very frequently for the scent to remain on him even when he isn't.

Buffy opens her eyes again. 'You seem to manage, though,' she says.

'Hm?'

'To keep up a smoking habit. You smell like cigarettes,' she clarifies.

'Oh, yeah,' he says. 'We get to go out every day, for a couple of hours; there's a courtyard. And they let us have cigarette breaks a couple of times a day, where the nurses take those of us who smoke outside so we can inhale. Try taking the right to self-medicate with nicotine away from a bunch of loonies and you'll soon find it's more trouble than it's worth. It's too early, though.'

They watch TV for a little while in silence, when Will suddenly groans and clutches his stomach.

'Hey, you okay?' Buffy asks, concerned.

'Yeah,' he says with a grimace. 'It's just the new meds they've put me on… Wreaking bloody havoc on my body, you know.'

Buffy puts a comforting hand on his shoulder, and he springs suddenly to his feet. 'Don't!' he shouts. 'No touching, no…' His eyes flick fearfully about the room and he's begun to hyperventilate. 'You can't… They can't, they're everywhere!'

Two nurses come rushing over. They each grab an arm, and though Will tries to fight them, they manage to haul him, kicking and screaming, to the door at the far end of the room. Several patients have quit what they're doing and are watching the commotion with interested eyes. A few are cowering, obviously frightened by all the ruckus. Some don't appear to have noticed. The last thing Buffy sees of him before they shut the door is a pair of wide blue eyes. She realises with a jolt how Will differs from Spike. In all the time she knew Spike, she never saw him afraid; Will is terrified.


	3. Back Inside

_**Author's Note: **I just can't seem to stop working on this thing, and this in spite of the fact that I have a lot of other things that I _should_ be doing. Oh well. Fuck 'em. Anon reviewer _**_sogaking_**_ (thank you for your review!) asked me which reality was real. My answer is, I ain't tellin'. Partly because I don't like spoiling my own stories for people, and partly because the way this baby's writing itself, my plans are probably gonna crumble like a vamp in sunlight before long. _

_Big thanks also to **hulettwyo **and **merder4ever1 **for their reviews, and to everyone who's following, and to you, who just started reading, too, because you made it to chapter three and that makes you awesome._

_Hope you all like the chapter!_

* * *

CHAPTER THREE

Back Inside

She's running through the streets of Sunnydale, lost and confused. She's not sure what she's doing here, but she's crying. Then she remembers. The basement. Willow and Xander and Dawn. And the demon.

She comes to a sudden and complete halt. She feels sick, and bends over prepared to vomit, but nothing comes.

'Buffy!' someone calls to her. She hears approaching footsteps. 'Christ, Buffy, there you are!'

Spike grabs her by the shoulders and pulls her upright, his blue eyes searching hers.

'Buffy, can you hear me?'

She nods, slowly.

'Listen, we've got to get you home–'

'No!' she screams, and her knees give out from under her. Strong arms hold her steady. 'I can't go back there! They're dead… I killed them…'

'No, you didn't,' Spike insists, shaking her a little.

'I set the demon on them!'

'Yes, you did, but they're okay. I took care of it, I stopped the demon. They're fine.'

She looks up at him, trying to regain her balance. 'Really?' she asks, shakily. 'They're… they're okay?'

'Yes, and they're worried sick about you, and Willow's made more of that antidote, so we need to get back there and–'

'I don't want the antidote,' she interrupts him. 'I don't understand what I'm doing back here… I'm better now… I'm better.'

He studies her face, and she looks away.

'You really don't believe this is real?' he asks, quietly.

Buffy shakes her head. 'No,' she says. 'None of it.' She laughs humourlessly. 'I mean, this world is ridiculous! It doesn't make any sense. There's no such thing as vampires and demons and monsters, and hellmouths! Everything here is fiction. Things like these only exist inside our heads…'

'So, I'm not real then.'

'No, you're real,' she says, looking up at him again. 'Just not _this_ you. I mean, you're not a vampire.'

She's standing on her own two legs now, and Spike lets go of her. He frowns and reaches into the pocket of his leather duster for a pack of cigarettes and his lighter. 'You mean, in what you think is the real world you knew me before you went crazy?'

'No,' she says, hazel eyes darting around nervously. 'I… You're at the mental hospital. You're sick, too. And you're human. You just… slipped through.'

Spike lights a cigarette. 'Huh,' he says. 'So, did any of the others "just slip through", too?'

Buffy shakes her head and looks down at her feet. 'No. Just you, as far as I can tell.' The smell of cigarette smoke reaches her nostrils, and she can hear the leather of Spike's duster creak. She's been hoping that this is just a normal dream, but dreams aren't this real, this solid. She's hallucinating again.

'So… In the attractive dream world that the sting of the Glarghk Guhl Kashmas'nik made you see… The only other person from the real world is me?' He blows out a puff of smoke and smirks at her.

'No,' Buffy corrects him, 'Will is the only person that I've seen so far who bled through from the real world into _this_ nightmare.'

'Will, is it?' Spike looks away and curls his tongue behind his teeth, releasing a short bark of a laugh. He flicks some ash from the end of his cigarette and runs a hand through his blonde hair. It's come loose from its gel. He must have been looking for her for a while. 'You know, Slayer, this is bloody priceless.' He glances up at her from beneath his dark eyebrows and shakes his head. 'Come on, I'm takin' you home.'

'I said, no!' Buffy says, taking a couple of steps back away from him. 'I… I can't face them.'

'If this is just a dream, why does it matter?'

'I don't want to see them. They… They're not real and…' She trails off.

'Well, I can't let you go wandering around on your own. Far as I'm concerned, this _is_ the real world, and it has monsters in it, and you're in no fit state to fight them.'

'Then take me somewhere else. Just… not there.'

'Fine, we'll go to my crypt, then.' He extends his hand towards her.

Buffy glares at him suspiciously. 'I'm not sleeping with you again, Spike.'

He raises an eyebrow. 'I thought none of this was real. What harm would it do to shag me in a dream?'

Buffy keeps her expression stony and folds her arms over her chest, standing her ground. Spike takes a step back and raises both his hands up in front of him, palms out, a gesture of peace.

'Relax, I'm kidding, not gonna try and shag you, love. Scout's honour.'

Buffy rolls her eyes. Then she sets off at a trot in the direction of the cemetery. Spike falls into step next to her. Every once in a while he glances at her, the look on his face one of uncertainty and apprehension, but they don't speak. When they reach the crypt, Spike opens the door and walks in ahead of her. Buffy takes a deep breath and steps through the door.

The musty smell of dust and dirt fills her nostrils. It is an oddly comforting smell. She closes the door behind her and watches as Spike goes over to his fridge, pulls out a bottle of pig's blood and starts to prepare it in a mug on top of the sarcophagus. She's hardly been here since they stopped sleeping together, but the place is much the same, except of course that Spike sleeps up here again now, since she and Riley blew up the downstairs.

'Make yourself at home,' says Spike, without looking at her. He's mixing blood with whiskey. Then he holds up the bottle. 'Want some?'

Buffy shrugs and walks over to him, taking the bottle from him. She takes a swig and grimaces. It's strong, but strong is good. It's not like it'll hurt the real her, anyway.

Spike takes a sip of his very literally bloody drink, and sits down on the sarcophagus, eyeing her thoughtfully.

'What?' she says, eyes narrowing suspiciously.

'Never know where I stand with you, Slayer,' he says. 'One moment you hate me, the next you're kissing me, then we're fucking, then we're not… And now, you've decided you're not even really here.'

Buffy laughs derisively. 'Typical Spike, you think everything is about you, don't you? Arrogant, much?'

He snorts humourlessly and looks away. 'I'm just wondering where this complete denial of reality is coming from. Before, it was the Glarghk Guhl Kashmas'nik's venom that did it, and you kept switching back and forth and you were confused as hell. But you've been right here and completely lucid since I found you, except you keep insisting that this isn't real.' He takes another sip of his drink and looks at her. 'This is the kind of certainty that's only found in the deeply insane. I should know, I spent over a century with a loony. But the rest of you is normal. It's scary.'

She raises an eyebrow at him. 'Scary? I scare you?'

'No!' he says defensively. 'It's just unsettling, is all. It's like you trust the voices in your head more than you trust what's around you.'

'Spike, you _are_ the voices in my head, and I _don't_ trust you.' She sighs. 'I just want to wake up. Get back to the real world. I had a pretty good day, you know? Talked to real people, lead something akin to a normal life. Then I went to bed, and suddenly I'm here. Here is not where I want to be. Least of all _here_ here.'

'Least of all with me, you mean.'

'Yes!'

There's a flash of something in his eyes, and a look of hurt briefly passes over his face. Then he laughs. It's a harsh, barking sound. 'At least some things never change. As usual, you come to me for help or comfort and all I get in return is a slap in the bloody face!' He stands up and begins to pace the room. 'I don't have to help you, you know, but for some insane reason, I still fucking do! I must be one hell of a masochist, because this shit, this is what's truly mad,' he turns on her and points a slender finger at her, 'that after you intentionally hurt me and push me away I still fucking love you, you daft bloody bitch!'

The silence that falls is deafening, and they stand there staring at each other for a moment. Spike is panting and working his jaw furiously. Then he lowers his hand and turns away.

Buffy takes a deep breath. 'Spike, I–'

* * *

She sits up with a jolt. Her whole body is shaking, and she's cold sweating. Her sheets are soaked with it. Before she has a chance to get her bearings, she's leaning over the edge of the bed, vomiting onto the floor. When she's finished, she wipes her mouth with the back of her hand and, after pushing the button next to her bed that calls for a nurse, she lies back down again, trying to steady her heavy breathing and pounding heart. She breathes with her mouth, not wanting to smell her own puke.

It was a dream, or she was hallucinating again. 'Having an episode', Dr. Warrens would say. It felt so real… Every sight, ever sound, every smell… She shuts her eyes tightly. 'This is real, this is real, this is real…' She repeats it under her breath like a mantra. She's in the real world now. There is no Sunnydale; there never was.

And yet she can't help but wonder what it was she was really going to say to Spike back there.

* * *

'I understand you had some adverse effects from the new drugs we gave you, Miss Summers?'

'Uh-huh, you could say that,' says Buffy. She's in Dr. Warrens's office, leaning back casually in her chair. The doctor studies her face for a moment. Then he smiles.

'These are perfectly normal side effects, I'm afraid, but I'll see about changing your dose or combining with something else if they become to bothersome,' he says.

'So…' says Buffy, holding out the 'o'. 'You're telling me that a common side effect of the medication you gave me to combat my hallucinations is… hallucinations.'

Dr. Warrens smiles apologetically and nods.

'Huh. Learn something new every day.' Buffy runs her hand through her hair and glances at the walls of Dr. Warrens's study. Then she looks back at him. 'Oh, hey, I was meaning to ask… Is it possible, in a case like mine, for some things from the real world to bleed through into the delusion, even though the patient appears to be completely unaware of her surroundings?' _God, I sound like Giles… _She shakes her head, as though to shake the thought from her mind. She has to stop comparing the real world to her delusion.

Dr. Warrens folds his hands on the desk and leans back a bit in his seat. 'Oh, certainly it's possible. Sounds and smells and sometimes even things you see but don't realise you're seeing can enter into your hallucinations in one form or another. Any particular reason why you ask?'

Buffy chews the inside of her cheek thoughtfully for a moment. 'Well… One of the… characters, I guess, from my… whatever you wanna call it… I met him yesterday. Here. At the hospital.' She glances at her doctor, who makes no move to speak. 'It wasn't a hallucination, it was real. We talked for a while, and watched TV, and then he had a… fit, I guess, and got dragged away.'

'Do you know the patient's name, Miss Summers?' Dr. Warrens asks.

'His first name's Will,' says Buffy. 'He's English.'

'Ah, yes.' Dr. Warrens nods. 'I know who you're talking about. And Will also exists in Sunnydale?'

'Yeah,' Buffy confirms. 'He's got a different name, but it's the same person. Right down to his choice of words and the way he smells…' She turns her eyes away again. Dr. Warrens knows a lot about Sunnydale and the people there, probably from her ramblings or something, and she's not entirely sure she wants him to know who Will represents, if he doesn't already. _How much does he know?_ she wonders. Does he know about her relationship with Spike? Did she talk about that?

If he's guessed, he doesn't let on, and he doesn't ask about it either. He simply smiles at her.

'Maybe that's a good thing. Maybe having something so familiar right here will help you remember what's real.'

'Yeah,' says Buffy. 'I hope it will…' She glances at the clock on the wall. It's just gone ten in the morning. 'How much time have I got?' she asks.

'I have another appointment in about ten minutes,' Dr. Warrens tells her. 'This isn't really a full session, just a little chat.'

'Do you think when we _do_ have a full session that we could, I dunno… Go over my timeline? You know, help me figure out how the real world ties in with the world I've been imagining.'

'I think that's an excellent idea, Miss Summers,' says Dr. Warrens. 'Set up an appointment with Dana when you leave, and we'll get started on that at our next session.'

Buffy stands up and smiles at him. 'Thank you, doctor.'


	4. The English Patient

_**Author's note: **Man, I'm really cranking these out! Chapter four already? What is this inspiration! I have officially replaced my nanowrimo novel with this. This, I might actually finish before November's out... Huge, epic thanks to guest reviewer **Rachel** who left the most awesomely inspirational review. Thank you, thank you, thank you, I love you! Now, without further ado, new chapter. Enjoy._

* * *

CHAPTER FOUR

The English Patient

When Buffy gets to the rec room that morning, Will is nowhere to be seen, and he doesn't make an appearance all day. Buffy watches TV and talks to a few people. When they go outside, she mostly just sits on a bench and watches a very disorganised game of basketball. In the afternoon, she is roped into a very boring and unproductive group therapy session. She sits in a circle with seven other people who don't seem to want to be there, either, and who all seem crazier than her. When it's Buffy's turn, she introduces herself, tells them she had another hallucination last night and leaves it at that. The doctor running the session, a slightly chubby Asian woman named Jenna who prefers to be called that rather than Dr. Hung – something Buffy can fully appreciate – tries to coax something more out of her, but doesn't get much, and so they move on.

'S-s-so, h-how come W-w-will doesn't have to sit through this shit, huh, J-j-jenna?' the man next to Buffy asks when it's his turn, and Buffy perks up a little in her seat. If Will's in her therapy group, maybe this won't be so bad. Assuming he comes back, of course.

'I-I mean, it's not-not exactly f-fair, is it, that-that we have t-to be here if-if-if h-he c-can just _not_.' The man speaks with a slightly high voice. He's been twitching and shifting in his seat all through the session and is clearly the jittery sort. He has wide, grey eyes and short black hair that stands up at the back. He's quite skinny and short, maybe shorter than Buffy, but it's hard to tell because he's very hunched at the shoulders.

'Donald, Will isn't here because he's sick,' Jenna explains patiently.

'Yeah, well, we're all sick,' says a tall, skinny girl with brown hair whose name Buffy thinks might be Sandra, and a few of the other patients give snorts of laughter.

'Will had an episode yesterday,' Jenna continues, ignoring the girl. 'He's resting up. He'll most likely be back tomorrow.'

_Tomorrow?_ Does that mean they expect her to do this every goddamned day? Buffy sighs and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, looking longingly out the darkening window.

That night, she's given a sedative and falls into a dreamless sleep almost immediately.

* * *

The following morning, Buffy returns to the rec room to find Will seated before the TV again. He looks pale and weary, and his shoulders are slouched. His knee is bouncing up and down rapidly. She approaches slowly and very carefully sits down next to him.

'Hi,' she says softly.

His head snaps up and his eyes meet hers. 'Oh. Hi. Hello.' His voice is low and a little hoarse. He clears his throat.

'You okay?' Buffy inquires, a little sheepishly. She doesn't know what else to say.

Will gives her a weak smile. 'Yeah. Mostly. I think.' He frowns. 'It was… Yeah. Bad times.'

Buffy nods sympathetically. She instinctively wants to squeeze his shoulder or make some other sympathetic gesture, but considering what happened last time she doubts it would be well received. Instead they watch TV in silence for a while. On the screen, two people are lying to each other.

'Oh, come on!' Will exclaims suddenly at the TV. 'How can you be that stupid?'

Buffy giggles. 'You're watching a soap opera, Will. These characters aren't exactly known for their mental capacity.'

Will shakes his head defeatedly. 'I'm so disappointed in her now…'

Buffy laughs outright, and he looks mildly offended, but then he glances at her and smiles.

'My body rejected my meds,' he says after a moment.

'Huh?'

'You're wondering what happened the day before yesterday,' he says calmly. 'You're not asking, because you don't think it's your place, but you're wondering. So, I'm telling you.'

Buffy smiles and looks down. 'You don't have to,' she says. 'Jenna told us in group yesterday that you had an episode…'

'I think the term you're looking for is psychotic break,' Will corrects her. 'My body rejected the new meds, so they stopped working properly. It was really sudden, and when I looked at you you weren't… you anymore. And I was being told to…' He looks away from her. 'It doesn't matter. But, yeah… Sorry if I scared you, love.'

Buffy studies his face. His blue eyes are fixed on the TV, his dark brows furrowed. He has his arms folded across his chest and is leaning back in his seat, his knees apart. His right leg is vibrating again, a nervous tick. She has a sudden thought.

'How'd you get your scar?' she inquires.

Will's hand moves automatically to his left eyebrow and he rubs at the scar absentmindedly. 'I was careless,' he says, shrugging.

'That's not much of an answer.'

He glances at her, a twinkle in his eye. 'Did vampire-me have this scar?' he asks. Buffy nods. 'Tell me how he got it, and I'll tell you how I got mine.' He smirks.

Buffy shakes her head, smiling. 'Spike fought a Chinese vampire slayer during the Boxer Rebellion. She cut him with a sword before she died. It left that mark.'

'Huh,' says Will, curling his tongue behind his teeth in the exact same way that Spike always does. Did. Would have, were he real. 'You gave these characters comprehensive histories, didn't you? You should write a book.'

'Maybe I will some day,' Buffy replies with a grin. 'Now, spill!'

'Right,' says Will. 'It's not that interesting, really… I had this compulsion, needed to get outside, and it was the middle of the night. So, I went out, picked a fight, got beaten pretty badly and left for dead. Fuckers stole my wallet, too…' He seems to have relaxed a bit. His knee is now still. 'This was back in London, years ago. Before I came to LA. If it had happened here, it's possible I would have died, either because they would have shot me, or because I wouldn't have been found. But someone saw what happened and rang the police.'

Buffy pulls her feet up beneath her and turns towards him, resting her elbow on the back of the couch. 'When did you move here?' she asks curiously.

Will clicks his tongue and gazes off into the distance for a moment. 'I'd say… About ten years ago, maybe?' He shrugs. 'It's hard to say, really. You kind of lose your sense of time in here…' He scratches the back of his neck and yawns.

'And why'd you come here?' Buffy ventures.

Will grins his most Spike-like grin yet. 'For a girl,' he says and chuckles softly. 'That's always the way of things, innit? Why men do stupid shit. For a girl.'

'She must've been special,' says Buffy.

'Not really.' Will shrugs. 'She was just a girl. I was in love with her. She was a few years younger than me, and she went here for uni. I followed, like some sort of lovesick puppy. Took a few classes, dropped out, got a job. We broke up about three months after we got here. I think she's probably back in England now.'

Buffy smiles. Then she looks away thoughtfully. 'Hang on… If she was younger than you and she came here to go to college… And that was ten years ago…' She turns to him again. 'How old _are_ you, Will?'

He smirks. 'How old do you _think_ I am?' he asks.

'Oh, God, I hate guessing people's ages!' says Buffy and leans her cheek on her palm. 'Can't you just tell me?'

'One guess,' he says. 'If you're wrong, I'll tell you.'

Buffy turns her eyes down for a moment, trying to think. How old was Spike when he was turned? Did he ever tell her? She mentally slaps herself when she remembers that this isn't at all relevant; if she ever knew, it would have been as much of a guess as this. His girlfriend had been a few years younger than him. Assuming she was as young as eighteen and fresh out of school, he must have been at least twenty-one. He doesn't look much older than thirty…

She opens her eyes and glares at him, but she's still smiling. 'Fine,' she says. 'I think you're… thirty… two?' she guesses, her smile gradually replaced with a pained expression. 'Sorry, I suck at this!'

'You flatter me,' he says with a smirk, one eyebrow cocked.

'I'm sorry!' says Buffy again. 'Come on, you promised you'd tell!'

'I suppose I did,' says Will with a sigh. 'All right then… I'm thirty-six.'

Buffy blinks. 'Wow… really? You… You don't really look it.'

He smiles. 'Yup,' he says, popping his 'p'. 'Still get carded. Or, still _got_ carded before I came back here… This is a strictly no booze zone.' He cocks his head to one side. 'How old are you?'

Buffy blushes and looks down. 'Twenty-one,' she mumbles. 'You're, um… You're a lot older than me…'

He laughs at her reaction, but it's without malice. 'Twenty-one, eh? So you've only just reached legal drinking age. In this country, I mean.'

She looks up, grinning. 'Yeah, but I mean, I started drinking–' She cuts herself off, her grin instantly wiped off her face. 'No, I didn't,' she says, her voice flat. 'I… I've never been drunk. That was… not real. I've never even been with…' She trails off, looking away and blushing furiously, the full extent of her situation hitting her like a tonne of bricks. She's never been drunk, never driven a car, never had sex. In this reality, the real world, she's still a virgin. She feels her eyes tear up suddenly, and wipes at them furiously. All those moments, all those feelings that she's felt for other people, they weren't real. They were never real. They were figments.

'Hey,' says Will softly, and she looks up at him. His expression is mild and sympathetic, and very kind. 'It's all right. Things are a little more fluid in here. Time sort of stops moving. Shit gets muddled. And with a psychosis like yours…' He trails off and smiles at her. 'It's gonna take some getting used to.'

She nods. 'Thanks,' she says, wiping away her tears with her sleeve and sniffs. 'And I know. I just… I can't believe that all those experiences that I had… that they're not real.'

'They may not have actually happened, lamb,' says Will, 'but that doesn't mean they're not real. Everything that's happened to you, real or imaginary, has changed you in some way, sometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse. Whether it's true is irrelevant; the impact it's had on you as a person is still real.'

She stares at him, wide-eyed. Then she smiles weakly. 'You're pretty smart,' she says.

He grins. 'Nah, not really. But I can fake it.'


	5. Smoke and Leather

_**Author's Note: **Now, for what you've all been waiting for: Smut warning for this chapter! I know, I took my sweet time... Anyway, it's nothing big, just a little something something to whet your appetites. I don't mean for this fic to be porn, though, just so we're clear. _

_Big thanks to **mybad, 01SpiderMonkey01, Abstracted **and** Rachel** for awesome reviews, you guys are beautiful! And in response to Rachel: 10 years of Spuffy? Wow... I've been writing fanfic for that long, but I only started watching Buffy last summer, so I'm a relatively new arrival in Spuffyland. This is also pretty much my first time shipping canon and het, which is a really weird feeling..._**_  
_**

_Thanks also to everyone who's following. I'm up to 12 followers now, __whoop!_

_Hope you all enjoy this chapter as well! I should warn you that this one took a little longer than the previous ones, so it's possible that updates will be a little less frequent in future... By that I mean that I might not be updating every day anymore. So no worries, I still expect to be doing loads of writing on this._

* * *

CHAPTER FIVE

Smoke and Leather

The musty smell reaches her nostrils before she even has the chance to open her eyes, and she knows instantly where she is. She seems to be lying on something soft, and she's covered up and warm. She slowly opens her eyes. She can hear someone move about and squints through the semi-darkness. The only source of light is a few lit candles scattered about the tomb. She takes a few deep breaths and pushes herself up into a sitting position.

'Buffy!' Spike is at her side instantly, on his knees. He's wearing a blue button down shirt over his black tee. 'You're awake!' His voice sounds almost panicked. He takes her hand and presses her knuckles to his lips. She snatches her hand back.

'What… why am I–'

He cuts her off. 'It's been two days. I was this close to ringin' Red and getting her over here to work some mojo or something. You just kind of… fainted. Only your eyes were still open and you were sort of responsive but not… This can't go on, love, I know you said you didn't wanna go back home, but for fuck's sake, you go on like this it's gonna kill you!'

'Spike, shut up,' says Buffy, holding up a hand. 'Just back off, okay?'

He sits back on his haunches and folds his arms over his chest. Buffy rubs her eyes. She's on a mattress, and she's covered in a soft if slightly dirty blanket. She feels exhausted, and very hungry. Her stomach growls.

Spike can obviously hear, because he gets to his feet and hurries to the fridge. He returns a moment later with a couple of slices of cold pizza on a plate.

'Eat,' he says. 'I won't have you starving to death on me while you're off in your fantasy-world. You don't get to die again.'

She eats. Spike vanishes again and returns with a large bottle of water. She drinks deep.

'I managed to make you swallow some water while you were out, but that was all I could do…'

'Where'd the mattress come from?' Buffy asks between swallows.

'Nicked it,' Spike answers nonchalantly and shrugs.

Buffy glances at him. The worry is evident in his face. She doesn't know how to react to him. She spent almost all day with Will. They talked about everything. Music, politics, movies, their pasts. She now knows a great deal about Will's childhood – grew up in Camden, working class background, never bothered with school – and he about hers. In group therapy they kept exchanging meaningful glances while the others talked and were told off by Jenna more than once for being disruptive. She can't remember ever becoming this close with someone in this short a time span, or of having this much to talk about. She's missed six years of her life, and Will is happy to fill her in on what's going on in the world.

It's hard to remember that the person in front of her now isn't Will. That he isn't even real. This is Spike. She made Spike up, and even if he shares his appearance, mannerisms and quirks with Will, he is something entirely different.

He watches her as she eats and drinks, quiet now. When she's finished, he takes the plate and bottle away.

Buffy rubs her face with her hands. She's not very clean, and feels like she should take a shower or something, but Spike doesn't have one of those. Then again, this is just a hallucination, so it's not like it matters.

'Spike, what are you doing?' she asks. The vampire is moving about the crypt, moving things, cleaning things up. It's oddly domestic and entirely strange.

He stops and looks at her. 'I'm cleaning, what's it look like?'

'I mean… with me. Here.'

'I'm helping you,' he says flatly. 'It's what people do for people they care about.'

Buffy shuts her eyes for a minute and heaves a heavy sigh. 'Why am I here again?' she whispers as her eyes tear up. 'I hate this…'

'Yeah, fine, you hate all this, it isn't real, blah blah blah,' says Spike mockingly. 'I get it. You hate being here, you hate me, and you wanna go back to the "real world". Whatever…' He returns to her and sits down at her side. 'Buffy, I dunno what's goin' on, okay? I haven't got any answers.'

'How could you?' says Buffy. 'You're just a part of my subconscious…'

'Yeah,' Spike scoffs, reaching into his pocket for a pack of smokes. 'Course. Just a part of your subconscious, me. A manifestation of some bloke you liked the look of.' He glances at her. 'This figment of yours… Or this real-life me, depending on your perspective… You in love with him?'

Buffy looks up at him, eyebrows raised. 'I…' Is there any point in lying to someone who isn't real? 'I don't know,' she finishes, truthfully. 'I might be. Or I might be falling in love, at least… He's older than I am.'

'So am I,' Spike points out. 'So was Angel.' He lights a cigarette. 'How's he any different from me? Aside from being human?'

Buffy smiles weakly. 'He's not evil,' she says.

'Neither am I!' says Spike. Buffy cocks an eyebrow at him. 'Okay, yeah, I am, but… I'm tryin' not to be. I know you don't believe I can truly feel love… And maybe I can't. Maybe what I'm feelin' for you is some twisted, selfish form of love, or just lust. That might be true. But I still feel it, and I'm tryin' to… I'm trying to do what's right.'

'It's not in your nature, Spike,' Buffy argues.

'Fuck my nature!' Spike snarls, getting to his feet. He starts to pace. 'I'm bloody sick of my nature, it hasn't done me a lick of good in over two years… Can't be human, can't be a vampire. This is what I've got, and it's not pretty, but it's me. It's what's inside, and I'm wearing it on my bloody sleeve for you!' He stops pacing, pointing his cigarette down at her. 'Because, God help me, everything is still about you. Which makes sense, cause this is _your_ delusion, innit?' He takes another drag of the cigarette, filling his dead lungs with smoke. Then he drops the half-smoked thing to the floor and puts it out with his foot. He sticks his hands in his pockets and glares at his shoes.

'Spike.' Buffy enunciates his name in a quiet yet firm voice. He turns his blue eyes on hers once more, and they gleam in the dim candlelight. She's not so sure exactly what it was she meant to say. She expels a shaky breath of air. 'Whatever it is I feel about you… It isn't real. None of this…'

'…Is real,' he finishes. 'No, I know, you keep saying.' The fight seems to have gone out of him and he sits down on the cold stone floor next to her mattress. 'But even if that's true, I don't think it makes your feelings any less real.' Buffy opens her mouth to protest, but he cuts her off. 'No, think about this. If I'm not real, if I'm a manifestation of him, then whatever you feel about me you feel it because you feel it about him.' He pauses, considering his words. 'I mean, what you feel…' His brow furrows. 'You know what I mean. And if this is the real world, and that's the delusion, then whatever you feel for him is what you really feel for me.'

'This _isn't_ the real world,' Buffy insists.

'Fine, let's say I accept your premise,' Spike counters. 'That this is a dream or a psychosis or whatever. Then anything that happens here happens because your subconscious wills it.' He lowers his voice and gazes intently into her eyes. 'I want you because your subconscious wills me to.' He reaches out hesitantly and strokes her hair, tucking a strand of it behind her ear. 'Because you want _me_,' he whispers. 'Or him. Either way, if this isn't real… Why shouldn't you just give in?'

She searches his eyes, expecting to find that arrogance and certainty that she's grown so accustomed to seeing there, but there's barely a trace of it. All she sees in his blue eyes is want and sincerity.

And then he's kissing her, gently yet passionately, and she realises with a jolt how much she's missed his kisses. How much she's longed for his lips on hers.

He shifts onto the mattress next to her, his arms circling her waist, and she allows the kiss to deepen, her lips slipping apart to admit his cool tongue. The familiar taste of cigarettes and a trace of iron coats the inside of her mouth. The kiss remains tender and not at all forceful. Then he pulls back a little, gazing into her eyes.

'Buffy…' he murmurs, and he strokes her cheek gently with the backs of his fingers. 'Let me give you what you need. Let me make you feel good.'

And Buffy thinks, to hell with it. This isn't real. This is a dream or a hallucination. And this is what she wants.

She captures his lips with her own, kissing him deeply, in the way she's missed so much. His eyes widen in surprise, but it doesn't take long for him to lean into it, and soon he's lowered her onto the mattress. His weight on top of her feels comforting, familiar, sweet, and she forgets to feel embarrassed about how unkempt she is, and why should she when this is all in her head?

His hands roam over her body, hungry but slow, and as he attacks her neck with lips and tongue and blunt teeth she can feel his cool and pointless breath on her skin. He smells of leather, cigarettes and alcohol, and as cold hands reach up under her blouse, she gasps audibly.

Spike strokes her breasts through her soft bra, causing her nipples to harden into pebbles. Then he slips his other hand inside her pants, and she throws her head back, moaning as one of his fingers enters her. She runs her fingers through his platinum curls, pulling, scratching at his scalp with her fingernails.

'Spike,' she whimpers, and his lips return to hers, swallowing her moans and gasps. Her hips push back against his hand, and he releases her lips, leaning his forehead on hers.

'That's it, love,' he murmurs. 'Let it take you… Feel it, Buffy. Lose yourself in me. You know you can. Let me give you what you need…'

As she gets closer and closer to bliss, his words dissolve into nonsense in her ears, mingling with her own moans and cries.

'Buffy, I love you,' he whispers. 'I'll always love you…'

* * *

She wakes with a jolt. Her sheets are soaked in sweat again, but she doesn't feel sick like last time. It's the middle of the night, and everything around her is quiet, save for the distant howls of some poor lunatic or another.

Her breathing is laboured and she tries to calm down. Shifting a little, she notes that her panties are soaked. Her heart is pounding, and there's a tight, tingling feeling in her gut.

Buffy shuts her eyes, wanting to go back there for the first time since she woke up in this place. Wanting him to finish what he started, to bring her to completion. But she's awake now, and she can't choose to return to her hallucination.

But she can imagine. She lets her hand slide down her belly, under the sheets, until she reaches the lining of her panties. Her breath catches in her throat and she pauses, before going the rest of the way and letting her fingers take care of business.

As she does, she remembers cool, pale skin, blue eyes and sweet, soft lips on her own. She remembers muscled arms and strong hands, legs entwined with hers. She remembers the scent of smoke and leather.

She begins to shake as she gets closer, and she bites her lip to prevent herself from crying out. She doesn't want to be interrupted. And when she comes, she whispers, 'William…'

Afterwards, she falls into a dreamless sleep. Her last thought is that of gleaming blue eyes and a deep baritone voice whispering her name.


	6. Timelines

_**Author's Note: **I guess it's getting to be time I slap a general trigger warning for mental illness on this thing. This would __include suicide, psychoactive drug use, etc. Should be pretty obvious given the over-all themes of the story, but have one anyway._

_I realised after I'd come up with Will's last name that it turned into a subconscious nod to Ray Bradbury. If you haven't read any Ray Bradbury, do._

_Epic thanks to **SeaPea, BtheP, kim **and _**_nosurprises_**_ for being awesome and leaving such lovely reviews. I do this shit for you! Also, thanks to all new followers!_

_Nothing else to say __except, hope you enjoy this chapter!_

* * *

CHAPTER SIX

Timelines

'So, fall '97, Ford really did come to see me here?' Buffy smiles fondly. 'I wonder why I made him a villain… Did he ever come to see me again?'

Dr. Warrens shakes his head. He has Buffy's folder open on the desk before him. In it, he has kept a meticulous journal detailing Buffy's delusions. 'I'm afraid you did get something right,' he says. 'Your friend did suffer from a brain tumour. Your mother tells me… Well, a few months later, he…'

Buffy's smile has vanished and she feels her eyes tear up. 'He died,' she finishes. 'Wow… Nothing gets past me, huh?' She wipes at her cheeks hurriedly. She doesn't want to cry. 'So, let's see… After that, Ethan came back and there was that whole Eyghon thing… And there was never an Ethan here, that you can recall?'

'No,' says Dr. Warrens. 'Though you could have invented a name for someone you saw here.'

'Not really worth considering… Okay, what about Kendra? Black, high ponytail, Jamaican accent?'

'Another no. We've had no patients like that.' Dr. Warrens consults the folder. 'Your mother did have a brief relationship with a man named Ted, though, like the robot in your delusion.'

'What, really?' Buffy tries to read too, but he shields it from her. 'Hey, no fair, I have a right to know what's in my file!'

'Not yet, you don't, Miss Summers,' says Dr. Warrens, his tone firm but not unkind.

Buffy folds her arms over her chest and sits back, pouting. 'Fine,' she grumbles. 'So what happened with Ted?'

'He came by with your mother to see you once. They ended their relationship shortly after.'

'That's… boring. Nothing interesting ever happens in this world…' Buffy frowns. 'Couldn't he have, like, turned out to be a serial killer or something?'

Dr. Warrens chuckles softly. 'I imagine if he were your mother would have been a little bit worse for wear.'

Buffy sighs, secretly agreeing. She considers for a moment, trying to remember. 'No point even talking about the eggs, I guess, that was just stupid… Oh…' She trails off, remembering what came next. 'Angel lost his soul.'

'One of the more interesting twists of your delusion,' Dr. Warrens comments.

'You're such a geek,' says Buffy jokingly. 'This is like a science experiment for you, isn't it?' Her smile fades again and she takes a deep breath. Remembering Angel still hurts, even knowing he's not real. 'And then… Miss Calendar…' For a moment she thinks she might cry again, but reminds herself quickly that Miss Calendar was fictional.

'Yes,' says Dr. Warrens a little sadly. 'Jenny. She was a nurse here.'

Buffy looks up at him, wide-eyed. Out of all the people in her mind, Jenny Calendar was one of the few she didn't make up?

She doesn't have to ask. 'Jenny was especially interested in your case. She had some theories about perhaps being able to influence your delusions by way of outside stimuli. It's little wonder she manifested in your mind. When she left us… It must have hit you hard.'

'Which would explain why I gave her such a messy ending,' Buffy finishes for him. She doesn't want to think about Jenny, real or imaginary. So she moves on. 'There was that thing in the hospital…'

'You had a very bad flu,' Dr. Warrens tells her. 'The medication we gave you for it reacted rather heavily with the ones you were already on, giving you some fairly disturbing nightmares.'

'Hence the flu demon. Yay.' She shifts in her seat and runs her fingers through her hair. Remembering everything she hasn't really been through is exhausting. It's also making her realise how fucked up she really is. She flips through her mental archives. Poltergeist, fish-guys… 'And then I killed Angel,' she says out loud.

'Ah, yes,' says Dr. Warrens. 'This also marks your first alliance with the vampire Spike.'

Buffy gives a wistful smile. 'First of many,' she mutters. 'He helped me take care of Angel, and then he ran off with Dru. It's weird… Working with him, even though I hated his guts, was kinda fun…'

'Foreshadowing your sexual relationship with him later on,' says Dr. Warrens, making her jump in her seat.

'Hey, personal boundaries!' she splutters, blushing furiously and looking anywhere but at the mental health professional seated before her. 'That's… that's private and, and…'

'And imaginary,' Dr. Warrens remarks, almost but not quite smiling. 'Can I ask, Miss Summers… Is Spike based on William Halloway?' Buffy gives him a blank look. 'Will,' the doctor amends.

'Oh, is that his real last name? Wow, that's way better than Pratt,' Buffy mumbles. She looks away again, unwilling to admit it, unsure of what her doctor will say.

'Well?' he prompts her, trying to catch her eye.

'…Yes,' Buffy concedes in a small voice.

'I see,' is all Dr. Warrens says. She's grateful.

* * *

'William Halloway, is it?'

Will starts slightly as she sits down next to him on the bench. He's smoking a cigarette, as per usual when they're outside. Any opportunity to chain smoke. She asked him, the day before, whether he's thought of quitting, considering how jittery it makes him to go so long between smokes. He said it had crossed his mind, but that he had eventually decided against it. 'Besides,' he said, 'if I get too jittery they pump me full of all manner of pleasant psychopharmaca. The high is so totally worth it.'

It's a little chilly today. Well, chilly for LA in the spring, and he's wearing a leather jacket over his black t-shirt. Not a duster, like Spike wears, but a short, biker-style thing in fine black calf skin. On his feet he wears a pair of standard issue army boots, slightly worn. The smell of leather and cigarette smoke sends her back briefly to her dream of the previous night and she has to look away from his blue eyes in order not to blush.

'Oh, yeah,' he says. 'That would be my, yeah… name…'

'It's a cool name,' says Buffy. 'Bet you already know my last name…'

He grins at her. 'Well, yeah. Like I said, I listen well.' He takes another drag of his cigarette and flicks some ash from the tip onto the ground before him. 'How was your shrink appointment?' he asks after a moment.

'Oh, well, we went over my first couple of years here… Turns out you're not the only person who's slipped through. There was a nurse, and then one of my best friends from school came to visit me and he turned up in my delusion, too. As a bad guy, oddly, but I guess these things aren't really logical.'

'Talking about things,' says Will, smiling at her. 'Good. It's good you're making an effort at getting better. Me, I mostly have to rely on meds for that…'

'Sucks,' says Buffy sympathetically. She chews her lips thoughtfully for a minute, unsure of whether to share her thoughts with her new friend.

'Something on your mind, pet?' he asks, before she has time to make up her mind. She glances at him. He has his blue eyes fixed on her, head cocked slightly to one side, cigarette between his lips. Sometimes it feels like he's reading her mind, much like Spike does. Did. Never did, because he's not real.

'I don't know if I'm actually making that much of an effort,' she admits. 'I didn't tell Dr. Warrens that I'm still having those dreams… Or night hallucinations, whatever you wanna call them. I didn't lie I just… withheld.'

'So, you had another one?' Will asks, interest plain on his face. 'Was I in it? I mean, Spike.'

'Uh, yeah,' says Buffy looking away again. 'He was…'

'Oh, it was _that_ kind of dream, then?' Will leers at her. 'Was I any good?'

Buffy glares at him in mock offence. 'You're a pig!' she says, but can't stop herself from smiling.

'Sorry, I know, I'm insufferable,' says Will, smirking and leaning back in his seat. He finishes his cigarette and drops it on the ground before him, putting it out with his boot. Then he sighs, blowing out a cloud of smoke, and reaches into his pocket for another one.

'How are the new meds treating you?' asks Buffy, changing the subject.

'So far, so good,' says Will, lighting the cigarette. 'These ones aren't really stopping the voices so much as suppressing them. They're still nagging at me from the back of my mind, but I'm lucid enough not to do what they tell me.'

_Like my dreams… _'I kinda know what you mean,' Buffy murmurs, looking at her hands.

'So, how come you're not telling Warrens 'bout your dreams?' Will inquires casually.

Buffy shrugs. 'I dunno… Don't wanna…' She sighs. 'It's like, I know that I'm dreaming, or hallucinating, I know it's not real… But it's nice to just let go and be in it, you know?'

'You don't want to tell him cause then he'll make them stop,' says Will.

'Yeah.' Buffy turns her eyes to him once more. 'Exactly.'

'It's like a good trip,' Will continues. 'Where you know you're tripping, and you know when you wake up everything will be back to normal, and the stuff you're seeing doesn't freak you out, it just leaves you feeling mellow.'

'I guess, yeah.' Buffy smiles. 'Can't really compare, though, don't think I've ever really been… tripping. Guessing you have?'

'Why do people always just assume I've done drugs?'

'Cause of what you just told me?' Buffy laughs.

'Oh. Right.' He grins. 'Guess that blew my cover, huh? All right then, yeah, I have. Nothing hard core. Just acid, shrooms, pot…'

'Oh, hey, can you get medicinal marijuana here?' Buffy asks.

Will laughs. 'No, lamb, 'fraid not. THC tends to have a less than happy effect on the mentally ill. Can induce psychosis, latent schizophrenia, cause anxiety and the like. Things of the not so good.'

'Did it do that to you?'

'No,' says Will. Then he narrows his eyes and furrows his brow. 'Don't think so… No. Maybe.' He shrugs, takes a drag of his cigarette, glances at her. 'I already knew I was ill. There's history in my family. My mum's bipolar. I am too, actually. Probably part of the reason why I'm so difficult to medicate. The drugs for the different disorders conflict. Give me headaches, nausea, counteract each other… Either they stop working after a while, or they work so well they start shutting down my organs. Spent a few too many nights puking my guts out. 'S not pretty.'

Buffy smiles sadly at him. She hesitantly puts a comforting hand on his arm. He doesn't freak out. Instead he smiles back at her and puts his hand over hers. 'Poor Will,' she says softly.

'Yeah, 'm a right sob story, me.' He's smoked yet another cigarette down to the filter, and is quick to light another.

'Those things'll give you cancer one day,' says Buffy.

'So I'd be going from one hospital to another,' Will shrugs. 'Not like I'm ever getting out of here, and even if I do, I'll be back before long. Nothin' to tether me on the outside. Reckon it's why I broke last time.'

'You mean, there's no one to… keep you sane?'

He makes an expression halfway between a smile and a grimace. 'Not since Melinda,' he says. 'Since we ended it, it's only been casual relationships, work mates, drinking buddies… When I got out before, all I had was work, meds, visits to the shrink… No wonder I blew it, really.'

'What about in here?' she asks. 'Haven't you made any friends other than me?'

His expression changes to a genuine smile upon the indication that they're friends, and he takes her hand and squeezes it. 'Not really, pet,' he says. 'You don't really make _friends_ in here… Half are bat-shit crazy, can't tell which way's up half the time. The ones who aren't are either very anti-social, prefer to be on their own, or they get better and leave. Or they…' He trails off.

'What?'

'Well, some of them off themselves, don't they?'

'Oh.' Buffy looks down at her feet, and they're both quiet for a moment. 'Don't these places have all kinds of precautions to stop people from doing that?' she asks eventually.

'Oh, sure,' Will asserted. 'If they suspect you're even close to that point, they put you on suicide watch, tie you down at night, whole nine yards. But the ones who are really serious about it never say a word. They don't let on, they just go off quietly and do it, and there's nothin' anyone can do to stop 'em. They'll always find a way. Sneak in a blade, hang themselves by their bedsheets… Knew a bloke who drank drain cleaner. Broke into the janitor's closet. People come up with all manner of creative ways once they're properly suicidal.'

'Have you ever been?' Buffy asks quietly, daring a glance at him. 'You don't have to answer,' she adds quickly. 'I'm just… curious.'

'Couple of times,' he admits. 'I've had the voices telling me to off myself… And been fairly close on a manic streak, too.'

'Huh,' says Buffy. 'You'd think you'd wanna do it cause you were depressed, not the opposite.'

'Yeah, you'd think, wouldn't you?' Will smiles ruefully. 'When you're depressed you think about it, a lot. But when you're properly down there, you've barely got the energy not to shit the bed, let alone to figure out a way to end it all. It's when you're manic you're actually in danger of doing it. Did you know suicide is a listed side-effect of some anti-depressants?' Buffy shakes her head. Will takes a long drag of his cigarette. 'You get up there, you feel like you can do anything, and then sometimes, you get so fucking restless, you know? You feel like you just have to go _do something_. It can get fairly self-destructive. You'll get urges, things you have to do, have to try. Like jump out a window. Run in traffic. Climb buildings. Pick fights.' He gives her a pointed look and indicates his scar with the hand holding the cigarette. 'Anything to feel alive. And when you're in the territory of proper hypomania, you'll do it too.'

'I'm glad you didn't,' Buffy declares.

'Oh, I did.' Will's voice is quiet. 'I just didn't die.'

She gives his hand a squeeze, and he smiles at her. Then he looks up. 'Looks like it's time to go in,' he says. 'They're rounding up the herd.' He puts out his cigarette just as Tony the psych nurse comes up to them, holding out his hand.

'Give 'em here, Halloway,' he says. Will rolls his eyes and pulls the pack of smokes and his zippo lighter out of his pocket and hands them to the tall man before him.

'I don't get why I can't just keep them,' he complains. ''S not like I can smoke 'em anywhere without setting off the smoke detectors, anyway.'

'Hey, rules are rules, and how do I know you won't set fire to your bed or something? Being as you are a crazy person.' There's a twinkle in Tony's brown eye and his smile is good-natured. Buffy giggles.

As they start to head inside, Will whispers to her, 'Speaking of them not being able to stop you from doing something if you really want to…' He pulls a single cigarette out of his pocket and shows it to her when he's sure no one's looking. 'Got another lighter hidden in my room, and one of the loos has a window you can open just a bit. I'll smoke it through that window before bed.'

Buffy cocks an eyebrow. 'How rebellious of you,' she observes dryly as he hides the cigarette away.

'What can I say? I'm just bad.'


End file.
